


Candyman

by Balena (Contemptress_Balena)



Category: Gravity Falls
Genre: Dark, I just want you all to know that this isn't going to end well, M/M, Manipulation, gratuitous amounts of candy, implications of drugs, stranger danger, there's more going on here than what appears on the surface
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2014-10-22
Updated: 2015-02-27
Packaged: 2018-02-22 04:10:08
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Underage
Chapters: 2
Words: 9,705
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/2493908
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Contemptress_Balena/pseuds/Balena
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Dipper had always been taught to never accept candy from strangers. But candy is sweet, and candy from strangers is sweeter.</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. Candy Man

**Author's Note:**

> So this is my first Gravity Falls fic and probably millionth fic in general. It's my first time working with these characters and the first time really writing something multi-chaptered since high school since college took up so much of my time, so I'm getting back into the groove of writing things that aren't papers or assignments for my creative writing classes. But I've graduated and have a lot more time now so hopefully I'll produce some really good stuff that people will enjoy reading as much as I enjoy writing.
> 
> A couple things:  
> -I don't have a beta, but I try to proofread and edit my work multiple times before publishing. I am only human, though, and am bound to miss some things so I apologize for any mistakes.  
> -Bill is creepy, this fic is dark and may or may not make you uncomfortable at times depending on your tolerance for this type of content, but you've been warned. 
> 
> Anyway, here's my first Gravity Falls fic.

"Come on, Grunkle Stan! We're ready to go!" Mabel Pines called from the front door of the Mystery Shack. Her twin brother Dipper, sat on the porch leafing through his journal in an attempt to find out more about Gravity Falls' celebration of "Summerween." There didn't appear to be anything written about the summer holiday, but both Dipper and Mabel accepted it in earnest when they learned that they were essentially celebrating Halloween twice that year. The more candy, the better. 

It was two days before Summerween and the Pines family was preparing to head into town for last minute shopping. The twelve year old twins had gotten their costumes a week ago (peanut butter and jam - a costume sure to multiply their candy flow simply based on the fact that they were twins), but their Grunkle Stan was still in need of a costume of his own and props for the house (he insisted that it took a great deal of time and planning to construct the perfect spooky house-costume combo that he was so famous for). They also needed to buy what would be handed out to all the trick or treaters; the thing that was the most important part and frankly, the whole point of Summerween: candy.

"Alright, alright. Here's the deal," Stan began as they climbed out of the car to the reasonably packed parking lot of the shopping center, "Here's some cash. You kids go take care of the candy while I go hunt for the perfect costume to scare the pants off the children that dare come to my door on Summerween night!" The old man let loose a maniacal laugh complete with head thrown back, raised hands and wide eyes that lasted for a good five seconds before he seemed to recall that he was standing in the middle of a parking lot and beginning to draw stares. His face sobered to a flat expression and he shut the car door. 

Mabel frowned at the ten dollar bill their grunkle had handed to Dipper. "Grunkle Stan, with only ten dollars we can either get only a little bit of good candy, or a whole lot of cheapo loser candy."

"Quantity over quality, kid," Stan said with a shrug.

"Pretty sure that's not how the saying goes..." Dipper replied with a shake of his head.

"Come _on_ , Grunkle Stan, every kid deserves awesome candy when they go trick or treating. Give us some more money so we can get better candy, pleeeease?" 

Dipper watched their grunkle's cheapskate resolve break with a heavy defeated sigh and the opening of a wallet after Mabel put on her cutest puppy face. Stan plucked the ten dollar bill from Dipper's hands and traded it for a twenty. "Alright fine, now get outta here, ya knuckleheads, before I change my mind. Meet back here in an hour or so."

"Yay! Thanks, Grunkle Stan!" Mabel cheered with a beaming grin, their grunkle turning away quickly to hide what might have been a fond smile. 

As Stan walked towards the costume store, Dipper stuffed the twenty dollar bill his uncle had handed him into his pocket and turned to his sister. "Okay, so I think for the best candy selection we should head over to--"

"THERE!" Mabel interrupted shrilly, gripping her brother by the vest and turning him towards the store that had been targeted by her finger. 

Dipper extricated himself from his twin's death grip and righted his clothing. The store that Mabel was practically--okay, literally--bouncing about was a modest sized, brick-faced building nestled between a cramped looking bookshop and a store full of mirrors. The shop that had his sister so enraptured had a golden yellow door with a small window in the shape of an eye near the top, and a black doorknob stuck in its middle. Printed on the glass window to the door's left in large swirled, fanciful letters was "EYE CANDY." Dead center beneath the "eye" and above the "candy" was a large staring eye with a long, thin pupil that reminded Dipper of a cat's. 

Dipper raised a skeptical brow. "You don't think that place looks sorta...weird...?"

" _You're_ weird Dipper," Mabel responded with a roll of her eyes, "And you keep talking about how everything in this town is weird so it's right up your alley. Besides," her eyes widened and shone, "CANDY!"

Dipper didn't even have the chance to get out more than a startled yelp as Mabel grabbed him by the hand and yanked him out of the parking lot and across the street--nearly getting slammed by an oncoming bus--to the yellow door with the little eye-shaped window and black doorknob in the center. 

"I got a good feeling about this place," Mabel reassured with a smile.

Dipper wasn't sure he agreed. He shook off a sudden, puzzling feeling of no turning back now as his sister gripped, twisted the knob and pushed the door open. 

The twins' faces upon entering the shop was the very definition of "like kids in a candy store." Dipper would have stopped to appreciate the pun if he wasn't so hypnotized by the sights all around him. Mabel who was starry-eyed by nature, now held galaxies in her eyes as what may have been tears of pure elation sparkled while her gaze grazed the walls and took in and reflected the glittering displays of sweet treats stacked from floor to ceiling. 

Cabinets composed of panes of stained glass in different colors encased crystal bowls and jeweled jars brimming with things like peppermint wheels, malted milk balls, and gumdrops. A rainbow curtain of long rock candy strings hung from hooks in the ceiling near the shop window, catching the sunlight in their sugared facets and showering the floor with fractured colors like the remnants of a shattered cathedral window. 

Dipper was staring open mouthed and wide-eyed as he inspected a display case housing a pile of chocolate bars neatly stacked in a pyramid and drizzled with caramel.

"Dipper," Mabel murmured, awe ringing in her voice "I think we got hit by that bus and went to candy heaven."

"Well hello there," a voice purred from further in the store. The twins jumped, startled out of their trances. They maneuvered between a mounted orb full of gumballs and a floor length jar of jellybeans (which stood beside a chalkboard sign offering a free mystery prize if the amount inside could be discerned) in search of the voice's origin. 

It didn't take them long to discover the source. 

Behind the counter at the back of the store was a man. He was watching them with an elbow resting on the wood surface, propping up his head that was leisurely tilted against his knuckles, a single finger tapping his temple. The careless smirk that tugged up the corner of his mouth matched the lax way in which he held himself.

"Whoa! Is 'Eye Candy' the name of the store or the cashier, amirite?" Mabel quipped, nudging her brother repeatedly with an elbow and grinning impishly. 

"Mabel!" Dipper scolded, "Sorry about her. My sister is kind of boy crazy..." he explained, ignoring his sister's mock-offended protests as the lank man sauntered from behind the counter. 

Dipper could see where his sister was coming from, though. 

The man before them was long and slender and moved with a smooth, lazy grace like a willow tree. His clothes melded to his form with sloping, flowing outlines. His black dress pants hugged the curves of his thighs and calves, ending in a subtle flare that gave way to his shined black shoes. The fitted button up shirt he wore was also black, rolled up to the elbows exposing olive skin, and adorned with a goldenrod tie looped around his neck. On his hands were shiny black leather gloves that made it look as if his fingers had been dipped in oil. 

He was achingly gorgeous with soft looking lips that curled with mischief and a sharp nose that ended in the slightest touch of an upward curve. His hair was long and dark golden butter blond at the top and front of his head, tumbling down in a sleek sheet to conceal his right eye, while the rest of his hair was cut closer to his skull and a deep dark chocolate brown. 

It was his exposed eye that was his most striking feature. 

Framed by long, dark lashes, mystery and deviance shadowed its corners. It was the color of sun-illuminated honey made all the more bright by the contrasting obsidian pupil that was fixed upon them. Dipper could practically feel, no... _sense_ this man's gaze pushing past clothing and the binding of skin and threadwork of blood, bone, and sinew into the deepest caverns of his being, probing his soul. And while he was young and fair of face, it did not hide the fact that this man was clearly much, much older than Dipper and his sister. 

His voice hinted at laughter that came easily and often. But there was something beneath its amiable current that whispered of temptation and tantalizing dark things; taboo and dangerous, yet alluring.

"Hey, don't worry about it," the man waved off with a smirk. "And what can I get for you two today, Shooting Star?" He slid his gaze from Mabel to Dipper, "Pine Tree?" 

Dipper tilted his head in bemusement as Mabel glanced down with a chuckle at her sweater that had a colorful shooting star stitched across the chest before grabbing Dipper's hat and waving it excitedly in front of her brother.

"Ha! I'm Shooting Star, you're Pine Tree! Get it?" 

Dipper snatched his blue and white pine tree hat back from his still laughing sister and jammed it back on his head, pulling the brim down over his eyes in an attempt to break eye contact with the man at the counter. He was watching Dipper intently with his one eye in an unnerving stare that for some reason made the boy's cheeks heat up and his stomach tumble. 

"M-my name is Dipper, and this is Mabel," Dipper more or less mumbled, "And you are..."

"The Candyman!" Mabel interjected.

"Bill. You can call me Bill. But Candyman is fine, too," he added, gracing Mabel with a fond smile. Dipper knew his sister would instantly be won over by this strange man. He, on the other hand, was a little more wary. Something about this guy--and if he was being honest, the shop itself--was giving him an odd feeling. He was sure he wasn't wrong in thinking that this place was weird. In fact, he was sure he wasn't wrong in believing that everything in this town was weird like Mabel had said. Despite what he was sure were red flags being planted in his gut, Dipper could not deny that he was absolutely intrigued by this Bill. Before he could get lost in his own head or Mabel could begin gushing, Dipper set aside his thoughts and decided to get to the point of their visit. 

"W-we're here for some Summerween candy to hand out." Why was he suddenly stuttering every time he opened his mouth? And did his voice really just crack on the word "candy?" He didn't need to see his sister's face as he could _feel_ the look she was giving him as she instantly picked up on his suddenly flustered demeanor and awkwardness. Well, increased awkwardness. The look his sister was giving him promised an incessant onslaught of teasing and twenty (more like twenty-thousand) questions with an intensity usually reserved for her most gossipy sleepovers. Great.

"Ah, of course," Bill nodded, resting his weight against an elbow placed on the counter. He seemed to be grinning at Dipper's discomfort under his gaze, but Dipper couldn't be sure. "A lot of people come in here looking for Summerween treats--and for good reason. I do have the best." He winked (maybe? It was hard to tell with only one eye visible) at Dipper, making the boy blush and tilt his gaze to the floor, barely catching the chuckle that softly echoed under Bill's breath. 

"But I think what I sell may be a little too gourmet for your needs," he continued, sweeping the arm that wasn't supporting him in a gesture towards all the displays. "After all, I make everything I sell here."

"You _made_ all of this?!" Mabel exclaimed in disbelief, "Wow! You're a candy master! You should teach me your skills and I'll teach you my arts and crafts master skills!"

Bill laughed breezily. "Sounds like a deal, Shooting Star." He pushed himself away from the counter and stepped between the twins, placing a gloved hand on each of the twins' shoulders, gently guiding them towards one of the store's walls. "Anyway, as I was saying. A bit too gourmet for Summerween, but I always make a point to set up a small section of specially prepared candy that can be easily handed out to the kids."

Bill led them to a medium sized glass case fitted with three shelves. Atop the encasement was a Jack-o-melon with a candle tongue gently flicking in its hyper-extended mouth. Each shelf within held a different bowl of mixed assortments of candies in small plastic baggies tied off with a black, green, or red ribbon. 

"Razzle-dazzle!" Mabel exclaimed. She turned to her brother with a wide grin, "We'll be the most favorite house in town if we buy these and give them out!"

"Yeah!" Dipper agreed, his enthusiasm bubbling up at the sight of such delicious looking treats. "We'll take twenty dollars worth!" Dipper produced the money from his pocket and handed it to Bill who fixed him with an amused smirk. As the man took the money, a single finger grazed the back of Dipper's hand. Dipper instantly felt a shock nip at his skin that was akin to when he and Mabel shuffled their socked feet against carpets and attempted to prod each other. 

Before Dipper could even register confusion, Bill was making strides back towards the counter with a "Comin' right up!" He placed the twenty in the cash register and grabbed a flattened box from beneath the counter. He popped the cardboard into shape, forming a cute pale yellow box with handles and the staring eye logo printed on one side. He returned to the Summerween case and opened it, taking out a designated amount of bags and placing them in the carry-out box. He went down on one knee, between and just behind the twins, until he was about at their eye level. 

He handed the box to Mabel with a winning smile, "One box of assorted Summerween treats, aaand..." he reached into the cabinet once more, taking a bag of candy in each hand. He put an arm around each of the twins, holding the bags before their eyes. "A free bag of sweeties for the sweeties."

Mabel was too engrossed in her excitement and inspection of the gift to notice how close to Dipper's ear Bill was when he spoke the words. Too engrossed to notice the way Dipper visibly shivered as the man's warm breath ghosted over the shell of his ear. 

As they left the shop, somewhere in the back of Dipper's mind the voice of his mother echoed warnings of never taking candy from strangers. 

**}0{**

"Oh come on, Dipper! I saw the way you looked at him and how you got sweatier and more awkward than usual when you were talking to him! You _totally_ have a crush on Candyman Bill! I mean, you could do worse. He's totally hot and his candy is actually the tastiest most delicious candy in the world ever..." As his sister rambled on, Dipper could feel his face flush as red as the (best) strawberry licorice whip he had (ever eaten in his entire life) been chewing on. Mabel had finished her free bag of candy on the car ride home.

It was nearing eleven o clock and the twins were in pajamas and had retired to their room for the night. Dipper had been lazily flipping through the journal while Mabel had been knitting a new sweater. That is, until she brought up Eye Candy and its odd, but alluring owner. And of course she delivered on the teasing her earlier look had promised. 

"Dipper, I had no idea you were into older men!"

"S-shut up! I'm not...it's just that...I dunno..." The thing was, Dipper was attracted to older people in general, and not just romantically. While Mabel was especially sociable and easily made friends her own age, Dipper's natural awkwardness and tendency to plan out the best possible method before diving into social interactions with potential friends hindered him. Not to mention that his love of reading had made it so that he preferred a decent amount of alone time spent reading, and choosing books well above his age and grade level. As most kids his age weren't reading the same books he was--if they were reading books outside of school at all--Dipper often found himself wishing he had older friends to discuss some of his favorite books with. Despite the fact that he clearly still had a lot of growing up to do (not just physically), he had always been told that he was strangely mature for his age. And while he loved being silly sometimes and acting like a normal twelve year old kid with Mabel, he still craved the company and acceptance of people older than him. It made him feel rather lonely at times.

But Dipper had come to terms with all of that a while ago. This was something completely different. 

When he first came to Gravity Falls and began harboring a crush on one of the Mystery Shack employees fifteen year old Wendy Corduroy, Dipper began to consider the possibility that perhaps he was also developing a thing for older women. It didn't come as much of a surprise seeing as he perceived Wendy to be cool, mature, and fearless--things he had always admired in people older than him. But a thing for older men, as well? That was something Dipper hadn't been prepared to think about. 

Dipper thought he had been sure about the nature of his romantic interests. He had been sure he had liked girls and only girls and in all honesty hadn't given any of it that much thought. He did recall incidents were he stared a little too long at another (older) guy or sometimes had really...weird dreams about (older) guys. But Dipper had chalked it up to him being a young boy who admired and envied older men he perceived to be cool. But he was beginning to think that maybe it was something a little less simple than that.  
Dipper's eyebrows furrowed as the implications of all of this tossed tumultuously in his head. What did he know about romance, love and...other things, anyway? How was he supposed to know? How did anyone ever know? 

So lame. 

Staring moodily down at his hands, Dipper began to worry his lower lip and felt sweat starting to form in his armpits and above his upper lip. 

"Hey," came Mabel's voice softly. Dipper looked up from his bedspread to see that his twin had left her bed and was now standing beside him and smiling kindly. 

"It's okay, you know," she began, "if you like guys. Or if you like both. Or if you're still trying to figure it all out. You're still the best brother I or anyone could ever hope to have, and any guy or girl would be lucky to have you like them." 

Before Dipper could begin to respond, his sister had thrown her arms around his neck and pulled him into a hug. Not one of their so named "Awkward Sibling Hugs," but a a soft, reassuring embrace that Dipper hadn't even realized he had needed. It reminded him of late nights in pillow and blanket forts with his twin eating junk food snacks and telling scary stories by flashlight; of countless times of dressing up like each other in an effort to fool their parents before Mabel got her braces; of being terrified of and then laughing about almost burning the house down trying to surprise their mom with her favorite treat of s'mores on the stove one Mother's Day. 

Of what if was like to never feel alone.

Dipper buried his face in his sister's shoulder, her soft sweater familiar and comforting. 

"Thanks, Mabel." The words were muffled, but not unheard.

"Any time, brother mine."


	2. Sweet Dreams

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> So an explanation as to my absence for the readers that don’t follow me on tumblr…  
> The reasons why I am only just now updating:  
> -I was participating in NaNoWriMo (National Novel Writing Month) which, for those who don’t know about it, is basically a writing marathon where the goal is to write 50k words worth of a novel between November 1st and 30th. Obviously that’s a lot of words in just thirty days and so I had to put this fic on the back burner. I am pleased to say that I successfully completed NaNo with 50, 481 words yaaay.  
> -December/early January happened, and it was just riddled with holiday junk and birthdays and was really a time/energy sap for me. And then I started building two new AUs and one of them is super intricate and expanded really fast and now I’m working on a bunch of fics for two different AUs as well as my novel and this fic. I hope you guys will be interested in checking those AUs out once I get some stuff uploaded.  
> -I’m a college grad so I’ve been doing job searching and interviewing which are basically jobs that you don’t get paid to do and it’s all so stressful and horrible and time consuming and uuuugh. Let’s not talk about it anymore.  
> -Believe or not, I have a real life that I participate in lol. Although, since I despise the winter and cold weather, I’ve been inside a lot more which means more time dedicated to writing.  
> -Also this chapter just did not want to be written for a long time. I had such writer’s block for this chapter and honestly the words didn’t start really flowing until a couple of days ago.
> 
> Thank you so much for the lovely reviews (they make my day), all the kind words sent through tumblr asks, your immense patience while I took so much time away to work on something I hope to publish and also to participate in life lol, and for just taking the time to read my fic. It really means a lot and makes me even more happy to keep working on it. I really hope you all continue to enjoy this fic. You guys are the best!
> 
> This chapter came out a lot longer than I anticipated so I hope it's interesting enough that you won't get bored >.> Long chapter for a long wait? I dunno, I just hope you like it lol
> 
> Also I apologize if there are any typos or discrepancies that I overlooked, or if it's just not as good as it COULD be. I don't have a beta and I tried to edit this quickly so you guys didn't have to wait any longer so...yah. I might come back to edit it later because I have a tendency to go back and reread and pick apart my work because I'm almost never 100% satisfied with it lol...
> 
> Alright, I'll shut up. Without further ado, I (FINALLY) humbly present to you the second chapter of Candyman.

**Chapter Two: Sweet Dreams**

_There's an old toy lost out in the woods with tired yellow eyes_  
 _It's wise, it lies_  
 _Chewed by the wolves_  
 _Thrown away by a child_  
 _All it ever wanted was your love_  
 _"And, children, I was made to have your love"_

**}0{**

Dipper wasn’t exactly sure how he ended up running through this forest that was both familiar and foreign all at once. All around him, buttery warm light poured down, disrupted by the gentle fluttering of the leaves that crowded and shifted in the breeze. The mellow luminescence of the summer light illuminated the long dirt path that seemed to stretch on forever beneath his feet.

Dipper also couldn’t be certain as to why he was running, but he somehow knew that stopping wasn’t an option. As far as he could tell, he was alone, and so while on more than one occasion he thought to call out for someone, anyone, he never did. The forestry around him was devoid of the sounds of bird, beast, or bug, and somehow it made sense to him to not disturb the quiet.

He didn’t even cry out when he tripped and fell forward, landing in the soft mud of the rain-soaked path. Not even a surprised gasp or whimper passed his lips. In the wake of his silence, the breeze picked up and Dipper thought he heard faint laughter. Laughter and a lazy, melodic humming. There may have been words threaded into it and he thought to strain to try and decode them, but at that moment something lying on the ground a few feet away captured his curiosity. 

Dipper picked himself back up, wiping his muddy hands on the fabric of his shorts as he went to inspect the motionless shape in the mud. At his feet was…a puppet? A doll? He stooped to get a closer look before taking it in hand and straightening up again.

It was the figure of a man carved from dangling wooden parts. Black pants and a black shirt covered by a goldenrod vest were stitched around its body. It was dirty and ragged. The fabric was faded and the wood was chipped with abuse. The tangle of yarn that was supposed to be hair looked as if it was once the color of spun gold, but now was only an unpleasant mustard hue. The back of the wooden skull was bare and painted a dark brown that had long begun to fade. Its eyes were round and set into the head. The left eye was painted a dull yellow while the right was a bloody, angry red. Both were pinned wide with long and sharp, black lines for lashes. Its mouth was no more than a thin stroke of black paint set in an unfeeling straight line.

Dipper frowned as he studied it. Something familiar about this mangled toy was nagging at him, but he found himself unable to place it. Deciding that it wasn’t very important, he focused his thoughts on looking for a way out of the woods. His best bet seemed to be to continue along the path for now. He clutched the strange doll to his chest, the thrumming of his heartbeat knocking against its wooden body. 

But before Dipper could take a step, one of the doll’s eyes—the right one—popped out and onto the ground, rolling away and moving with unnatural momentum further down the path. Dipper followed mutely, watching as it briefly blinked back at him with every completion of its rolling circuit. He allowed himself to be led like this for an immeasurable amount of time before the wooden eye halted abruptly, pupil pointed away from him. Dipper bent to reach for it and his fingers were just about to brush it when his own eyes followed its gaze. 

He had stepped into a clearing and at its center rose a cottage with walls and a roof of gingerbread baked by the rays of the sun. The roof was adorned with peppermint wheels that whirled and whipped cream that swirled sweetly along it. The fence was carved from white chocolate and enclosed a garden of striped stalks topped with full blossoms of cotton candy, hypnotically whirled lollipops, and chocolate roses wrapped in ruby red foil that glinted in the sunlight. Strawberry laces coiled around trellises fashioned from peppermint sticks and swirled lollipop rods. The windows were paned with sugar glass and a long licorice rope hung down for a doorbell pull. Poking their heads up from frosted flora stood motionless chocolate bunnies, frozen in stances of frolic. A tree stretched from the ground beside the cottage, its dark chocolate bark giving way to branches laden with candied apples. A bird’s nest was cradled in the bittersweet boughs, cupping large chocolate eggs. Dipper saw that one had fallen to the ground below and honeyed caramel ran from the crack, luminescent like liquid amber.

Dipper felt himself inching forward as the scent of sugar floated on an oven-warm breeze and filled his nose, sweetening his senses into lethargy. 

He vaguely remembered a story, a fairy tale his mother had told him and Mabel...Hansel and Gretel. A gingerbread house…siblings like them…endless candy filling their mouths…a witch…. Snapping out of his trance, Dipper hugged the one-eyed wooden doll tightly to his chest, and took a step back. 

There was no trusting a house made of candy and sweets. Seeking to devour, he would be devoured. He needed to get out of here. Resisting the call of candy and cakes, Dipper quickly turned to leave.

"There's no way you're leaving me to eat all this candy by myself are you?" a voice he knew bubbled from behind.

Dipper whipped back around to see his sister, dressed in a yellow sweater with a large, staring eye stitched across the chest. She was standing just outside the white chocolate gate, grinning her gleaming, silver studded smile. 

"Mabel...?" Dipper murmured, taking a hesitant step forward.

"Duh! None other!" she exclaimed. Her voice echoed strangely and her eyes, while the same brown as his, seemed to have an unnatural shine to them.

"Come on, Dipper, look how good it looks! You know you want to try some!" The strange reverberations of her voice trilled dramatically when she spoke his name. She reached out her hand toward him, palm up and in invitation. 

“Mabel, I don’t think this is such a good idea,” Dipper said uneasily, stepping back. “We really should get out of here.”

“Oh come on, Dipperrrr!” That dragging echo when she spoke his name again. “You love candy!” She was walking towards him, and the air around her seemed to warp and fracture with each of her movements. Out of the corner of his eye, Dipper was vaguely aware of the gingerbread house sagging, melting. The sky was slowly beginning to burn out from its initial pale gold to a deep crimson. The sun itself began to drip from above like a cracked egg yolk. 

“Dipperrrrrrrr” Mabel’s voice came again, scraping against the air, distorted but fading. In fact, Mabel herself—her eyes now a glimmering gold and wild—looked as if she was fading, too…as if she was melting into the air around her. The dark brown of her hair, brows, lashes; the pink of her gums and tongue and white of her eyes and teeth; and most strikingly, the violently bright gold of her pupils which were now shining like sunstruck medallions. All of it began to run like paint, dripping from her skin and blending into ugly colors and staining her clothes. The pupil of the stitched eye on her sweater began to roll madly.

Dipper wanted to run. He wanted to turn and run and not stop just like he had when he first found himself in this forest. But the mud beneath him had swallowed his sneakers and ankles and he couldn’t pull them out. 

“Come oon, Dipperrrrrrr!” She was reaching for him now, the color of her skin draining from her fingers and dripping heavily. Her mouth was too wide and her flashing eyes stayed on him like searchlights. Her voice sounded faraway and a deeper one so unlike her own began to grow from her throat. Her bones cracked and popped loudly as her limbs started to extend, the skin straining and splitting against the new lengths. “Just a taste of caaandyyyyyy!”

Dipper desperately tried again to wrench his shackled feet free. Instead, he lost his balance and landed heavily on his backside. His teeth snapped together painfully and his feet remained firmly set in the ground. The gingerbread house had caved in on itself, its walls and roof, swallowed by mold and flies. 

Mabel’s voice was barely hers at all anymore. It reverberated all around him, deep and guttural, her girlish voice weakly entwined with it. She continued to call his name, but Dipper dared not look at her.

Instead he looked at the doll that he had been fearfully squeezing to his heart. Its head had twisted all the way around to face him. The hole where its missing eye had once been was bleeding a thick, black ooze. It was smiling. 

Its one yellow eye, glowing faintly, was staring directly into his eyes and Dipper found that he was unable to break the gaze. A weakness began to settle into his blood and bones and before he could even attempt to steady himself, Dipper fell back into the cold mud.

The last thing he was aware of before he blacked out was the humming that had lured him there to begin with, a tall, dark figure walking towards him, and a man’s voice that spoke his name almost tenderly.

**}0{**

The morning before Summerween found Dipper waking to gray, watery morning light rippling through the window. He blinked several times up at the ceiling as the foggy remnants of an unremembered dream clung weakly to the edges of his memory before slipping into the forgotten. Rubbing congealed sleep from the corners of his eyes, he turned to face the opposite side of the room. Mabel, back to him and under covers, was breathing evenly, still deep in the stasis of sleep. Dipper frowned. If his sister hadn’t woken up yet, then it had to be pretty early in the morning, as she was usually the first one in the house to get up. Dipper toyed with and then discarded the idea of slipping back into slumber, feeling oddly wide awake. He sat up and slung his legs over the edge of the bed, setting his socked feet onto the floor.

He stood and stretched, the satisfying cracking of his sleep-stilled bones mingling with the morning melody of bird song and woodpecker tapping. Dipper shuffled over to the window that cut the center of the room and pressed his hands to the cool glass, leaning over the little table that sat below it. Peering through the window he saw that it had rained some time in the night. The sun was barely awake behind the screen of lingering rain clouds, casting a quiet melancholy over the earth and pines. Figuring that he and Mabel would most likely get stuck helping their Grunkle Stan decorate the house for tomorrow night all day, Dipper decided that he would take this rare early morning opportunity to walk through the woods.

Treading lightly so as not to disturb Mabel, Dipper crept from their room to the bathroom. After emptying his bladder, he quickly brushed his teeth, swiped on some deodorant, and splashed his face with cool water. He would shower later. Maybe. 

Stealing silently back into their bedroom, Dipper stripped his slept-in shirt off, and padded over to his dresser to pull out a fresh T-shirt and a pair of shorts. He dropped the journal into his knapsack before tossing it over his shoulder and stuffing his feet into his rain boots. Lastly, he smashed his pine tree hat onto his unruly bedhead. Casting one last careful glance at his sister, Dipper slipped from the bedroom, down the stairs, out the Mystery Shack, and into the shade of the trees.

**}0{**

Dipper had been aimlessly wandering for at least twenty minutes, contently absorbing the waking woods stirring all around him.

The air was thick with the wet scent of rain-washed earth and trees. His rain boots sank into the squish of mud littered with pine needles and natural debris as he continued to plunk along with no concern for any particular destination. Dipper had walked these woods many times since arriving in Gravity Falls, inexplicably drawn to it. Yet still for all his explorations, he was never exactly sure where he was headed whenever he passed beyond the shadowed treeline. He always felt that he was stepping into some enchanted forest sprouted from the pages of a fairy tale when he did. The air itself seemed to be heavy with secrets and mystery; whispers and disguised gazes that he thoughtlessly allowed himself to become lost amid. 

Dipper then began to think about the day before at the candy shop and how he had also allowed himself to get lost amid its treasury of treats. The way he had wondered and wandered there was akin to when he was here in the woods.

And then he began to think of Bill. Dipper had almost gotten lost in him, as well. Every time the man had looked at him, it was as if his gaze was searching him and willing him to come to him for a closer look. Every time he had spoken to him, his voice sang like a piped tune compelling Dipper to follow him to wherever Bill pleased. When he had touched him, Dipper’s bones had acquiesced to bow like branches in the wind, ready to bend to the whims and wishes of his touch. 

Dipper’s mouth twisted into an irritated pout. How could some weirdo guy he had only met one time make him feel so…helpless? Easily led?

Stupid. Stupid was the word he was looking for. The guy talked to him once and somehow managed to short-circuit his brain and turn him into a stumbling, sweaty disaster. Dipper kicked a rock irritably. He was just some weird guy who owned a really good candy store, and yet…

And yet Dipper could not deny that he was overwhelmingly curious about him. If there was one person who seemed to embody and radiate all the mystery and weirdness of Gravity Falls, it was Bill. Dipper couldn’t help but feel and, if he was being honest, hope that he and the man could have a very real connection. That if Dipper were to talk endlessly about his suspicions and theories about this town to him, Bill would not brush him off and say that he had an overactive imagination like his Grunkle Stan did, or label him a dork like Mabel often did. No, Dipper firmly believed that Bill would listen to him thoughtfully and share his own knowledge and theories before asking Dipper to accompany him on a mystery hunt. Dipper was sure that if he could stop devolving into a literal lame-brain every time he had to open his mouth around Bill, they’d discover that they had plenty in common and then he and Dipper would become friends. 

So what if he was a little…a lot older? Wendy was older than him and she was cool and got along with him just fine. Why should Bill be any different? Dipper decided then that the next time he talked to Bill, he would say all the right things at the right time and that Bill would realize how mature and interesting he was.

His idle musings and internal pep-talk were abruptly broken by a sound that stood out from the woods’ usual soft din. It was a gentle humming, floating on the breeze and curling into his ears; settling and nesting in his brain. Dipper was sure he had heard it somewhere before…but he couldn’t place where. Curious, he followed the melody, stepping over raised roots and ducking beneath brambles. It was not long before he reached a small, grassy clearing, softly illuminated by gray light filtering through the trees.

Dipper stifled a gasp when he saw a familiar figure kneeling before a bush laden with what appeared to be stark white berries.

“Well, hello there, Pine Tree,” Bill greeted softly, not looking at him.

Dipper very nearly jumped clean out of his skin. Bill had not acknowledged him before he had spoken and Dipper had no idea that he had become aware of his arrival “Oh! Uh…h-hi!” Dipper replied, scratching the back of his head uncomfortably and blushing when his voice cracked. Bill shifted his gaze from the berry bush to Dipper and favored him with that lazy half-smile that seemed so at home on his lips. In his hands were a pair of gardening shears that he was using to cut branches of berries from the bush. He refocused his eye on the task at hand, but Dipper could tell he was still attentive to his presence.

“What brings you out here so early in the morning?” he asked, momentarily abandoning his shears in favor of plucking and popping three berries into his mouth. He was wearing black jeans and a white button up shirt this morning, sleeves rolled up to the elbow and with just enough buttons undone to be tempting. Dipper felt himself beginning to sweat nervously and tried to focus on what Bill had asked rather than the space between his skin and fabric.

“Uh weird dreams, I guess…woke me up early and I couldn’t fall back asleep,” Dipper said, scratching at a mosquito bite on his arm and digging the toe of his boot into the soft dirt beneath the grass. “Everyone else was still asleep so I just decided to come out here for a walk.” Why was he so fidgety all of a sudden? What happened to all that determination he had just mustered only a couple of minutes ago? 

“Ah yes…curious things, dreams,” Bill murmured as he snipped another bundle of berries and carefully placed them into his basket. “Sometimes they can be just a jumbled mess of nothing and make no sense at all.” Snip. Bill turned his head to regard him with his exposed eye, then. “And sometimes…don’t you feel like they’re trying to tell you something? Lead you to something? You ever feel like visitors creep into dreams to try and reach you?”

Bill was watching him intensely now, his golden gaze boring into him. Dipper felt his heart stutter and he chided himself internally. How did this man always seem so at ease? So cool and collected and so sure in his own skin and space, while Dipper felt like he was constantly fending off multiple impending panic attacks? 

“You mean like psychic dreams, or…or visiting people’s dreams through astral projection or—” 

Bill laughed and shrugged. “Hey, stranger things have happened. You never know what’s out there…” he raised a finger and tapped his temple, “that can get into here.”

He turned back to his work of pulling berries, pausing to glance at Dipper again and raise an eyebrow.

“You know, it’s okay if you come stand over here,” Bill said, a small smirk forming on his lips, “I won’t bite.”

Dipper laughed quietly and tried to ignore the sudden heat in his cheeks. “Oh! Uh yeah…right, heh…”

“So,” Bill began casually when Dipper had lessened the distance between them, “do you remember these weird dreams from last night at all?”

“Um not really…like I feel like I remember some things, but every time I try to focus on them and really think about them, they just fly right out of my head.”

“Oh, is that so?” Bill murmured, watching him again from the corner of his eye, “that’s too bad.” 

When Bill didn’t say anything further, Dipper felt himself getting anxious again. 

_Okay, play it cool, Dipper. Relax. Just talk to him about anything. He doesn’t think you’re weird or lame. That stuff about astral projection? Awesome. He totally thinks it’s interesting which means he’ll think_ you’re _interesting for bringing it up. I bet he even thinks you’re cool. Er, I’m cool. Whatever. Cool._

"So what's that you're picking?" Dipper asked with feigned nonchalance, his eyes curiously roaming over the strange looking fruit.

"They’re called ghostberries. It looks like they only grow in this part of the woods. I've been keeping an eye on them for weeks,” Bill paused to chuckle lightly at the unintentional pun, “waiting for them to be ready for picking. I'm going to use them in a new candy I've got planned."

"No way!" Dipper's eyes lit up. After trying some of the candy that Bill had gifted to him and his sister, his tongue could not forget the memory of the divine flavors that had touched it. It had taken their Grunkle Stan hiding the box of candies meant for the trick or treaters in order to keep the twins from trying to gobble it all up before Summerween night.

"Yup! I hope to have it finished in time for Summerween tomorrow.”

“You gotta let me try some!” Dipper insisted before blushing, catching himself. He didn’t want to sound too eager. He didn’t want Bill to think he was just some dumb little kid who only cared about candy. “I-I mean, it sounds good and I’d uh like to try it sometime…”

Bill slid his one-eyed gaze to Dipper and snickered. He reached out for him and slipped his hand beneath the hat on Dipper’s head to ruffle the hair smashed up beneath, his nails gently scraping his scalp before withdrawing. Dipper couldn't tell if the light shiver that ran through him was from the pleasant scratching, or from the odd coldness that the absence of his overly warm hand left.

“Of course, Pine Tree, you’ll be the first to try out anything I come up with.” In the gentle light of morning, the gleam in Bill’s eye did not seem all that devilish, and Dipper felt himself grin.

“Really?” he asked hopefully.

“That’s the perk of having a friend who runs a candy shop, kid,” Bill said with a wink. 

Dipper felt his heart leap. 

“Friends?” Dipper murmured before he could think to stop himself. He felt his cheeks once again flush with embarrassment. He must have sounded stupid just then. But Bill only chuckled softly.

“Of course we’re friends, Dipper.” He reached for the bush, plucked a ghostberry, and took Dipper’s hand, turning it palm up and delicately placing the berry. “Here, try this.”

Dipper's eyes widened in wonder. "Whooa, it’s so light!" he marveled, letting the pale berry roll across his palm, just barely alerting the skin to its presence.

"That it is, Pine Tree," Bill said with a crooked smile, his bright eye tracing the lines of wonder on Dipper's face. “You should taste it,” he said quietly.

Dipper took the phantasmal fruit and brought it to his mouth. He gasped when the berry began to burst as soon as it touched his lips. Dipper quickly threw his head back to ensure that at least the majority of the berry made it into his mouth. He managed to achieve this with only a little bit of juice running down his skin, or at least he thought he did. It truly felt like he had eaten nothing at all. He was almost positive that nothing had actually gone down his throat, and yet an almost icy coolness was left on his tongue and a sweetness lingered in his mouth.

"Wow,” Dipper breathed, his face mystified, “it’s like eating…air…cold air, but…cold air that tastes really good.” His brain was still trying to process the experience when he looked at the bush again. “But…look at the branch," Dipper said, puzzled. "It's drooping so much...they look so heavy."

Indeed the ghostberries looked to be swollen with rain; crystalline droplets pearled their smooth surface and weighed down the branches. The airy weightlessness of what Dipper had just eaten did not feel like it could have come from the fruit.

Bill nodded. "It means that they're ready to be picked. It's pretty weird how it works, but everything is weird in this town, trust me.”

“I know exactly what you mean!” Dipper exclaimed too quickly, betraying his excitement, but this time he didn’t reign himself in out of embarrassment. “You have no idea how many weird and crazy things I’ve come across since coming to this town.”

Bill smiled and his face seemed to hold real interest. “Is that right? Tell me all about it.”

And so Dipper did, chattering animatedly about this and that, monsters and bizarre creatures and thoughts and theories while Bill listened attentively and nodded and responded and encouraged him to continue. They remained like that for a long time before Dipper thought to check the time.

“Oh shoot!” Dipper whispered, eyes widening at his watch and leaping to his feet, “It’s already ten-thirty, Mabel and Grunkle Stan are probably wondering where I am by now.” 

“Time sure flies when you’re having fun, eh, Pine Tree?” Bill said, slipping his shears into a leather sheathe, stuffing them into his back pocket and locking eyes with Dipper again.

“Yeah, it was fun wasn’t it?” Dipper said, an obviously pleased smile on his face. 

“Yeah.”

Dipper’s heart sped up considerably as Bill suddenly came up close to him. He had rolled onto his knees and so when he leaned in they were face to face. Suddenly, Dipper was very self-conscious about not having showered that morning. Bill reached a hand towards Dipper’s face, his molten eye boring into his.

He tilted Dipper’s chin slowly upwards with his hand.

And gently swiped at the corner of his mouth with his thumb. 

Bill grinned at Dipper. “Had a bit of berry juice on your face there.” He pulled back and got to his feet. “I didn’t want to interrupt you while you were talking.” He winked at him and stretched briefly.

Dipper hadn’t even realized that he had stopped breathing until he tried to speak and found difficulty. “U-uh thanks!” he said, coughing slightly. He knew he was blushing, but did his best to be nonchalant. Him? Flustered? Never.

“Anytime,” Bill snickered with a sly grin. “Hey, tell ya what, Pine Tree…swing by my place tomorrow night and I’ll let you try the candy I’m working on.” He hummed thoughtfully before asking, “You got a pen in that bag of yours?”

“Oh, uh yeah,” Dipper swiftly dug around in his pack and produced a pen. Bill took it with one hand while he reached into his pocket with the other and pulled out a business card. He quickly scribbled on it and handed it and the pen to Dipper. 

“There’s my address,” he said as he stooped to pick up the basket of berries at his feet. The back of the card had the name, address, and number of Eye Candy, and Bill had scribbled a house number and street name beneath it. The other side of the card bore the same giant eye that stared out from the window of the candy store.“Well, I’ve got more ingredients to gather and you should get home, so we should probably hop to it.” 

“Right,” Dipper said with a chuckle, glancing down at his shoes as he said rather shyly, “Sooo…I guess I’ll see you tomorrow?” When Dipper looked up, Bill was somehow already on the other side of the clearing, half shadowed by the pines.

“Yeah…see you tomorrow, Pine Tree,” he said, his golden eye winking from the shadows.

And then he was gone.

**}0{**

“Hey, where were you earlier this morning?” Mabel asked him later that day.

It was just after lunchtime and just as Dipper had suspected, Grunkle Stan had dumped a pile of Summerween decorations onto the floor in the sitting room where they had been watching TV, instructing them to sort through and cover the house in it. The pair and Mabel’s pet pig Waddles were on the front porch now; Waddles snuffling though decorations while Mabel busied herself with setting up plastic gravestones and ominous warning signs and Dipper tackled the task of hanging fake bats, spiders, and spiderwebs.

“Just went for a walk in the woods,” Dipper replied, pretending to be very serious about finding just the right places to hang the fake spiderwebs.

“That early? You’re never even awake that early, let alone out doing your spooky investigations in the woods.” Mabel said, coaxing a plastic femur from Waddles’ mouth before patting him on the head. 

“Well, that’s where I was,” Dipper said, trying not to sound defensive. “I just couldn’t sleep, so I went for a walk.”

“Uh-huuuuh,” Mabel said with an edge that Dipper didn’t like. “Are you sure you weren’t—”

“Oh no,” Dipper said with a roll of his eyes.

“—on a secret daaaate?”

“Here we go…”

“Maybe with—”

“Mabel, don’t you—”

“Candyman Biiiiiiill!”

“Aand there it is.”

“Come on. Admit it. You were, weren’t you? Huh? Huuuh?”

Dipper almost told her that it hadn’t been a date and that it had just been pure luck, er, coincidence that he had stumbled upon Bill in the woods. It wasn’t something that he should need to hide from her, and he could honestly endure the teasing. Dipper usually told Mabel everything anyway and there were hardly any secrets between them, and yet…

“I’m just going to ignore you, until you stop being weird about Bill.” 

Dipper turned to face her with an expectant eyebrow raised and waited for her to react. His sister looked as if she was about to continue her teasing assault before she rolled her eyes, blew a raspberry, and declared him to be “laaaame.” 

Reaching into one of the cardboard boxes at their feet and pulling out a bundle of zombie hands, Mabel began to chatter about how she was so excited for trick or treating, and that she was going to have a sleepover with Candy and Grenda afterwards, and something about romance novels, probably boys, and blah blah blah….

Dipper continued to hang spiderwebs, pretending to listen.

The more Mabel went on about her plans with her friends, the more Dipper realized that he desperately wanted to keep his budding companionship with Bill all to himself. Sure Candy and Grenda were nice, but they were Mabel’s best friends and Dipper really didn’t have much in common with them. Wendy was nice to him and genuinely seemed to enjoy his company, but then again, she enjoyed Mabel’s company, too, not to mention the fact that she had a circle of friends her own age that she hung out with. Soos was a great friend even when his man-childishness made him a little frustrating to be around, but again, he was a great friend to Mabel, too. Dipper really didn’t have any friends to call his own here.

And so was it really so bad, so selfish that he wanted to keep Bill a secret all for him? To want to have a friend that he didn’t need to share? To not tell Mabel that he had made plans to hang out with Bill tomorrow night?

_“Of course we’re friends, Dipper.”_

Dipper ducked and pretended to search in a box for something, hiding a smile. 

No…he didn’t think it was at all.

**}0{**

That night, in the deepest pits of sleep, Dipper dreamed he was in the woods again. He was running down the path, but this time it was night. There was no moon, no stars, no light. The doll he remembered finding was gone, lost to who knew where.

He was in danger. He didn’t know why or how exactly, but you were always in danger in the woods where no people were, right? 

That’s what the fairy tales he read growing up told him. They told him of witches and wolves that stalked just beyond the tree line, the shadows at their backs. And that if he strayed from the path for one instant, he would be devoured. 

Dipper continued to run, the muddy path squelching with each step. Time moved in a fragmented staccato; the woods and air stuttered and paused and blurred around him. Every step he took felt sluggish and hindered. He clenched his teeth and felt sweat forming above his lip as frustration burned his body and a stinging sense of urgency prickled his skin. 

His surroundings looked unfamiliar, but Dipper knew he had been here before. He couldn’t remember when or what had happened, but he just knew. He could remember the doll and a house made of sweets, and he remembered Mabel being there, and he guessed maybe that was why he was running. He needed to reach the house. Maybe Mabel was there waiting for him... 

She wasn't. 

But someone else was. 

The clearing with the house had come up on him suddenly and he had almost missed it because, frankly, it didn’t look like a house anymore. What lay before him when he came to a stop was a crumbled and ashen heap of rotten sweets, long lost to the grip of decay. The chocolate tree had melted and the candied apples had shriveled and turned black.

Momentarily stunned at the sight, Dipper was jolted out of his stupor when out of the ruins, a figure began to form from smoky blackness. Torn between curiosity and fear, Dipper began to cautiously step backwards while squinting through the darkness, trying to will the hazy lines and foggy shades into a coherent shape. 

And when they did, Dipper felt his heart stammer.

It was the little wooden doll he had found and then lost. But it was no longer wooden, nor was it a doll. He was a man, tall and lank. He was wearing the clothes that the toy had been wearing, but clean and crisp. His hair hung like a gilded curtain to obscure his right eye. His exposed eye was shadowed in the darkness, but Dipper could see it glinting gold at him.

He looked liked someone Dipper knew. He looked like— 

"Pine Tree, are you lost?" he asked, his voice friendly and concerned, "Come here, I'll help you get out of here."

Pine Tree. Someone he knew called him Pine Tree. Someone who— 

"Come here," he spoke again, more insistent, "We have to go to your sister. She's waiting for you."

At the mention of Mabel, Dipper’s apprehensive feet brought him closer. From the dark, he saw a hand extend out towards him. 

"Take my hand, it’s okay, I'm your friend..." 

Dipper felt himself smile. He would be okay. This was his friend. He was going to help him, protect him. He was going to bring him to Mabel. 

Then he frowned. “But I don’t want Mabel to know you’re my friend.” The words were muffled and heavy in his ears, filling his head with a dull pressure. “She’ll try to make me share.”

The man took a step closer, hand still outstretched. His smile was wide, now, wider than any smile Dipper had ever seen before.

“Don’t worry, Pine Tree,” his voice, velvet and comforting, spoke, “No one needs to know that we’re friends.”

Another step towards him.

“I’ll be all yours, Dipper.”

Another.

“And you’ll be all mine.”

And then he started to whisper; speaking to Dipper in the most secretive and softest of syllables. The pressure that had been dully throbbing in his head was pressing in on his eardrums now, and he couldn’t make out the words. Dipper wanted to hear what he was saying. Perhaps they were secrets he was trying to share with him; secrets between friends. He continued to walk closer, reaching out his hand for the beckoning blackness. 

His bare fingers brushed a hand smooth like leather. 

“Dipper,” he whispered.

The gloved hand enveloped his smaller one and yanked him forward.

Dipper stumbled and collapsed into strong arms that held him up. The whispers became more insistent, louder, but still unintelligible. A numbness like cool peppermint began to spread into his limbs, intertwining with muscle and bonding to his blood. As the sensation intensified, Dipper felt the strength in his legs rapidly begin to drain. Startled, Dipper frantically began to search for somewhere to escape, but there was darkness all around. He tried to pull away, but there was no resisting. 

Wreathed in shadow, the man leaned forward. Dipper could smell his overwhelming scent filling his nostrils, filling his brain. He smelled like sweets that he wanted to swallow sticky and whole and then...

A warm breath crashing against his parted lips like breakers on a shore. A single bright, yellow light that blinded his eyes. 

When Dipper woke up, his heart was pounding and the sun was pouring in, hot and burning. His shirt and hair were plastered to his skin with sweat, and his lips felt as if they had very nearly been kissed by flame. 

When he took a deep breath to try and slow his hammering heart, he was greeted by a sweet scent that hung in the air.

**}0{**

_You can’t ignore those evil voices when you sleep at night._

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> And that's the end of chapter two. 
> 
> What did you think? Let me know in the comments (I really appreciate them a whole lot), drop me an ask at my tumblr (bipsqvad.tumblr.com), and uuuh stay tuned for chapter three!
> 
> I sincerely hope it won't take as long to come out as this chapter did, but I am working on other stuff as well plus the whole real life thing, so I guess we'll see.
> 
> Also I have no idea what is going on with the formatting on Ao3 right now. For some reason it moved my chapter one end notes to here?? Oh well, as long as it doesn't mess up any of the actual fic.
> 
> Also since I already got one comment about this: Yes, please feel free to draw fanart if you wish. I'll love you forever. Post it on here or on tumblr in the BillDip tag and let me know :3
> 
> Anyway! Thank you so much for your patience and for taking the time to read and comment. You guys make the writing world go 'round <3
> 
> Until next time!
> 
> -Balena

**Author's Note:**

> Well there's chapter one. I don't really know what to say except thanks for taking the time to read, I really appreciate it, let me know what you think, and I hope you'll stick around for the rest of it.
> 
> Also, to check up on my progress or to bug me to work on chapters, inbox me on my fandom/fanworks-exclusive tumblr: bipsqvad.tumblr.com. I'll also post my fanart there as well as the link for this fic and others as I create them, so follow me if you're interested!
> 
> Thanks <3 
> 
> -Balena


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